Stargate: Day of Defiance
by Tyr44
Summary: The year is 2008, earth is in turmoil, nations are falling in military coups across the globe, friendships are falling apart between once trusted allies, and the greatest secret the world has even known is about to be disclosed in the worse possible way.
1. Prologue

17:49 June 26th 2008

Pentagon, Washington D.C.

In a somewhat inconspicuous office, inside the head of all United States military operations, where seemingly mixed with the hundreds of other officers, writing up, reading over, and filling reports by the bucket load, was a middle aged Major General. While he, like many others inside this building, had the unfortunate duty of going over the latest tactical report in a war far away from his position. Most would be worried about the dozens of military coups popping up in the middle east, and the unsuccessful peace keeping operations, but this man was reading reports from across the galaxy. Be they a Battlecruiser returning to earth for repairs, reports from off-world mining outposts, or hell, even interstellar contact, such is the life of General O'Neill, and the wonderful job being the head of Homeworld Security.

The man was becoming frustrated, his table full of reports of all sort. The sterile smell of the room filled his sinuses, the bland looking walls surrounding him. You would think that a man in his position would at least have a window. His stomach growled. All he felt like was something actually edible to eat, not like the stale half eaten sandwich in front of him. In fact, he decided, that's exactly what he was going to do.

As he barely raised himself from his chair the telephone rang. He sighed in protest, wondering if it was worth it to just ignore the call or not. By the fourth ring, he reluctantly picked up the receiver, and putting it to his ear he said in a bored monotone voice, "O'Neill."

"Sir, its Carter, I just got back from Area 51, you might want to have a look at the new beam weapon. They are having a test fire tomorrow," she said, now full colonel had been temporarily transferred to Nellis to help Thor reverse engineer those big honking space guns of his. Five times he had traveled across the country, and five times had the thing had either collapsed, died, or in one case, exploded, and suffice to say, he didn't have much faith in tomorrows test.

While trying to reason with his former second in command, he was frantically going through his schedule, "Gee Carter, I'd love too, but the thing is I've got this thing going on, like tomorrow or something." Looking for some sort of excuse, he found none.

"I've read your schedule sir, you've got nothing." You could almost sense the smirk on her face, he just had no idea how she knew.

"How did you…?" he asked casually, if a colonel, even one with top-level clearance, had access to his account.

"General Landry owed me a favour." Well that made more sense, Beau had been working more and more with O'Neill ever since the plans for disclosure were put under way. He just didn't know what would shock the public more, the stargate, or the fleet? Ronson and Landry often bickered about it. He for one thought the public would be much more shocked that the 3 men commanding all the spacefaring forces constantly bickered on who commanded the better force. All round O'Neill won, since he commanded both of them. They stated it was unfair, but he always smirked and said typically O'Neill like, "Tough."

"Sir?" Carter asked concerned at his silence.

'Ah yes, carters new toy,' shaking the precious thoughts off quickly, he came back to reality. "Sorry I was thinking. Well as long as this thing doesn't go the way Felger's tinker-toy did…" Not a second later he mentally kicked himself, he knew where this was leading…

"No sir, but if your interested we've made massive strides with the plasma cannon, apparently the rel…" her explanation was sickeningly enthusiastic, little did she know, he took quite an interest in reading the new tech reports, too bad he didn't like hearing it twice.

Rubbing a hand through his hair he groaned slightly, "Carter..."

"Sorry sir," even after 10 years, her over explanations still managed to both enlighten and irritate him. "In any case we decided to make your trip somewhat special, the Theseus will transport you from DC to Nellis." Great, now he couldn't even take a plane like a normal person, he had to take the big starship to work. 'Oh well,' he sighed 'its better then walking.'

"You've planned this haven't you?" He asked, just now catching onto her little plan.

Once again, he could sense the smirk on her face, 'oh she will pay for this!' "For 2 weeks sir, have your transporter relay ready by then," she said. "The Theseus will be ready for at 10 am tomorrow, see you soon."

'Ah, at least it's only the jump to and from, I don't think the President would like a nice big Daedalus Class landing in front of the pentagon, I'm sure his plans for disclosure, were a little more subtle.' O'Neill thought as he said, "Bye Carter." He hung up the phone, and then realized that he was still hungry. His day at the office nearly over, he reluctantly stuffed the sandwich in his mouth, and packed up ready to head back to his hotel room. "Just another day in the life of General Jack O'Neill," he commented to the empty room.

Area 51, Fleet Yard

While not much of a yard per say, the massive underground bunkers that were ever growing to support the additional ships in the ever-expanding fleet of the United States Air Force. Now the specially designed repair bays; that would make repairing the giant starships that much easier, held, what was considered the pride and joy of the American fleet, the USAF Daedalus. Three years of making the Earth to Atlantis run had let it see surprisingly more action then any other ship in the fleet. When the others were dealing with the goa'uld, it was dealing with the wraith, a threat that was easily much larger then the parasites that once plagued this galaxy. Through these constant battles, her hull was starting to tear, and as much as her captain the higher ups like Brigadier General Ronson, and Admiral Keyes saw differently. It was about time she had a major refit.

On the base surface Colonel Cardwell, captain of the Daedalus had at least another week before his ship could leave the yards and enter service again. Usually when not on his ship, he spent his time on Atlantis, exploring to seemingly endless city, however being in another galaxy put a stop to those plans. Shepard had finally taken his leave on earth. 'It was a good thing too,' the colonel thought. 'The man could finally have a break.' However as Cardwell was now watching, Lieutenant Colonel John Shepard was doing anything but relaxing.

Zooming across the skyline in a seemingly insignificant golden speck, was the prototype multi-vector gunship. Thankfully there were no reporters, or UFO skeptics/fanatics, and the test flight was living up to expectations. The twin anti-gravity engines placed on the gunship's sides allowed for an off the charts level of agility. Now the gunship moved itself into a hovering position above the base. The colonel could see where the design was based from, its shape matched that of standard helicopters used today besides the two large, but surprisingly flat Goa'uld based gravity drives along the sides and the lack of any rotors.

His small comlink picked up the radio chatter coming from the flight tower above, "Okay Colonel you are clear to land, nice flying up there."

"Thank you control it's been a pleasure, now anything special you want? I'm feeling a bit cocky here." No doubt this was Cardwell, he remembered some of the stuff the man did, or tried to do at the battle of Atlantis three years ago.

He could hear the slight chuckle from the flight operator, "Standard landing will do Colonel."

"Roger that, Anti-Grav engines are powering down," He sounded slightly disappointed, and Cardwell knew it was sincere, that man loved his flying.

Slowly descending to the surface, the dust that had settled across the concrete surface jumped away from the constant pushing force of the engines. Landing gear dropping, the gunship put down extremely smoothly, he couldn't even see the slightest bounce as it touched the surface. As the canopy opened, the flight crews rushed a mobile ladder towards the deactivated gunship, slowly the lieutenant colonel climbed down still wearing the jumpsuits used by almost all Atlantis personal, his helmet half undone.

Now he was walking towards the colonel, as he finished removing his helmet in the process, leaving a goofy grin in its place, "Did you like?"

Nodding at the question, "Yes one of the first actual craft to not have a fault on its test flight."

The grin grew wider at the thought, "They call it the O'Neill Effect you know."

Now that brought a smirk to his solemn face, "That makes sense, anything advanced that man touches seems to explode."

"He's not as bad as Beckett at least," Shepherd said now putting his gloves into his helmet.

"True," The smirk growing into a full sized smile, but then quickly took a dive into curiosity. "What are they planning on calling it? AH-307 doesn't really have a nice ring to it," he said as they both walked towards the installations direction.

That thought caused a look of concern and concentration on Shepard's face, in the end he shrugged it off with the slightest smile, "I don't know... kinda hope they call it the orca."

That raised the colonels eyebrows, "Oh?" looking back at the gunship's direction, trying to find for whatever reason he thought it would be an appropriate name. "Looks nothing like a whale."

Shepard continued to grin, he himself looking at the gunship, not making the connection himself, "Sounds like one."

Now that was just down right stupid, "Your kidding right?" At the still remaining grin he knew he wasn't. He then gave the typical smartarse response. "In any case your since your so keen in using your vacation time to test out new toys, the research staff have been itching for you to test out some of the ancient technology gathered, in the meantime, I have a new XO to meet," as the colonel walked in the other direction, leaving John Shepherd shrugging, as he left his equipment at the supply station next to him. He liked to play with his 'toys' he thought as he headed to the R&D hanger.

USAF Prometheus, Alpha Centuari System

On an extremely Terran like planet in Earths closest star system, was the growing and thriving Alpha Centuari Colony. A collection of portable buildings surrounded the so far, sole permanent facility. It was huge, holding a hanger bay, command centre, deep space radar, warehouse and lab faculties, such that you would expect of a growing military outpost.

On the long recently dug out runway, held the massive form of the Prometheus. The still active Battlecruiser took up much of the empty land, but unlike the bigger Daedalus class, the Prometheus class was the only thing that fit in the heavily forested area. Pendergast was starting to wonder why they decided to set up here anyway.

With the flash of the Asgard transporters, he remembered, Trinium. The sixth and final shipment was quickly moved off the transporter pads and moved into the cargo bays. That was it and it was time to go.

The video screens above the bridge window jumped to life, all displaying Colonel Jefferson from 'Farpoint's' command station. Apparently some trekkies got the option of naming the colony. Despite that it seemed fitting to Pendergast, "That's it Prometheus, just let our people out of there and you can be on your way." The colonel on station was barely giving the view station any attention, obviously caught up with whatever he was typing below.

The colonel quickly returned to the captain's chair, as all other crew members were doing the same to their stations, "Roger that Farpoint, preparing launch sequence."

"Just don't miss the deadline this time, or you'll have 4000 angry men and woman wondering where their food is." Jefferson said jokingly, still typing away.

Pendergast grinned, because the Alpha Centauri system was inside Earths section of space, it was the same stargate address, and as such could not have its own. This forced Earth to make regular shipments of supplies, and resources between the colony and Earth, and as the colonel just pointed out. "That was Avengers fault Farpoint, yell at them next week."

Finally looking up, Jefferson said in mock seriousness, "Oh we will, tell them to expect an earful, in any case, all personal are clear..." Turning to see the blast doors close around the control centres windows. A good idea considering the Prometheus was literally on their doorstep, and there's always room for caution when a 270 metre Battlecruiser is about to launch, "You are free to launch."

Nodding the captain looked at Lieutenant Colonel Erin Grant, she herself looking over the final reports from engineering, nodding to the captain "We're ready sir, on your orders."

Facing the patient man on the video screens the captain gave a casual wave "Acknowledged Farpoint, see you next week." The screens instantly turned off and together the crew now awaited the final orders, "Anti-gravity engines online. Take us out, standard procedure."

The helm acknowledged, with the tap of just a few keys, a low humming sound emitted by the inbuilt engines below the ship, "Aye sir, primary engines on standby."

The first capital ship of earth slowly rose from the somewhat bare airstrip with a billowing of dust and dirt. Slowly it rose, without much sound over then the constant hum of the gravity drives, but as it held itself roughly 200 metres from the surface. The primary engines roared to life, sending a thunderous clap echoing into the skies, the blaze of ionized energy in the engines, grew with intensity, and the Battlecruiser slowly pushed into the sky, leaving the small outpost behind.

From the bridge, the bright blue sky gradually grew darker and darker with each passing second. Before anyone realized, they were out of the planets atmosphere. Leaving the sparkling planetary blue orb behind them, the ship continued to fly into a higher orbit and into the twilight of space.

"Estimated time till we leave Alpha Fours gravity well?" Pendergast asked to Grant. Grant, while ship XO, was also in charge of calculating hyper-jumps. Since jumping inside a gravity well was basically insane, or in advanced races opinions, merely difficult, the question fell under her job description.

A quick readout on her console gave the answer, "Roughly 50 seconds, shall I calculate the jump path to Sol now?" on his nod she brought up another window on the small touch screen, and quickly typed in the data necessary for the jump.

Pendergast himself tried to get comfortable in the surprisingly unpadded command chair, "And now we wait."

Hundreds of thousands of kilometres away, a cloaked ship waited, and watched. The raging storm of hyperspace opened in a furious but beautiful display of light. The Tau'ri ship plunged in, no doubt heading for their Homeworld, no matter, it made the job of scanning that much easier. Little did the fools know, Baal would make his return, and the Tau'ri will take the first blow.


	2. Chapter One Annoyances of Old and New

7 hours later Unknown Sector, Baal Controlled Space

High above one of the numerous outpost worlds under the somewhat weakened domain of the Goa'uld known mainly as Baal, dozens of pyramid like ships gathered into formation. Ranging from the small corvette like bombers called al'kesh, or to the monstrous 'standard' starships like the Ha'taks, while squadrons of death gliders flew in between the giants, like insignificant insects.

Near the planets sole moon, the flash of hyperspace came into being, a small cargo ship exited swiftly, turning tightly in the fleet's direction, letting the acceleration from hyperspace do the work. Watching from afar was the self appointed god himself, in side the safe but menacing form of a Goa'uld Mothership, Baal inwardly snarled, even after years of preparation, of rebuilding, he would never return to his former state of power. Every time that thought came to mind, and it often did, he always knew who to blame, the shol'va Jaffa that declared themselves 'free'. But then he considered the route of it all, the problems that had occurred in the past decade that had almost thrown the Goa'uld out of their dominant position in the galaxy, the meddlesome people that had continued to deny their place under his heel, the Tau'ri.

In the few mere years that they had joined the galactic scene, dozens of Goa'ulds from various levels of the hierarchy had fallen to them, some in the most pitiful of ways. It all started with Ra, then after Apophis made them his personal enemy, he had fallen no less then 3 times to them, not to mention the other Goa'ulds that rose and feel afterwards, Hathor, Sokar, Cronos, Nitri, hell they even managed to take out Anubis..somehow.

That's when he took his chance, centuries of preparation, secretly building his worlds too a standard that only Sokar had on his former Homeworld of Delmak, in which great cities spreading for hundreds of miles were spotted across the magnificent globes of blue and green, massive starbases orbited each world also, allowing the thousands of starships of various size to come and go, making trade runs between outposts and capital worlds, continuing their military patrols, or even just his many underlings going about their daily business.

While this was but a few worlds, his domain was expanding, quickly engulfing what remnant Goa'uld held territory that still spread across the galactic plain. With each world captured, more resources were brought in, be they the material kind, or man power, it just expanded with every turn, and like the years before, in which Ra ruled supreme over all, Baal had recreated the dream, he had made a true Goa'uld Empire.

But through his constant planning, building and selective battles, against certain Goa'ulds, and 'trying' to keep the innate feeling of arrogance in check, which was an accomplishment far greater then the empire that he was building mind you, 'like trying to hold back a wave with a wooden dam.' The self-appointed god mused mentally, not even noticing the Jaffa Master enter his chamber.

The aging man bowed respectfully, only then did Baal jump out oh his trance, turning to look down at the master from his heightened position, the original Jaffa, before his recent request to his human subjects too join his armies, suffice to say it was somewhat effective, and his armies while less then half they were before the rebellion, were ample enough to for his needs." My lord, I bring word of our scouts from the Tau'ri outpost." The Jaffa reported from his still kneeling position.

Ah yes, the cloaked tel'tec that he had ordered to the alpha century system, as the captured Tau'ri SG team had informed him. Interrogation was so much easier, albeit much less entertaining if the prisoners are just implanted with a Goa'uld, while somewhat tiresome, very little information was given up from his new born 'children', though a name or too, a number of ships the Tau'ri had, was all he needed, the rest he would find out through his own means.

"Excellent" the smile on his face took no small hint of smugness, "What was learned?"

Washington D.C. 9.34 am, Local Time, 27th of July 2008

Hayes was pissed.

It was the simplest way of putting it, the US President, most powerful man on earth, was absolutely fuming at the latest report, the new Egyptian government had out right refused the use of their territory for the numerous military bases that the US held in the area, hell they even outright demanded that they leave the place within the next 4 days, or all they'll be considered as hostile targets!

"Damn Arabic bastards!" the president just a bit too loud, his aide jumped slightly, as he threw the 16 page report against the wall, the papers spraying everywhere as the small clip that held them bounced off.

General Peter Pace, chairman of the Joint Chiefs gave a small forced smile, he himself didn't like the idea anymore then his CnC, but this was going to happen some day. "Just hold that tongue at your speeches sir, we've been waiting for this for months now, our men will be out of there in a few hours."

But that did nothing to calm down Hayes, his face growing red with anger his hands waving in the air for the sake of it, "That's not the point, and I know you know it also."

Before the general could even open his mouth to respond, the presidents aid butted in "You have too consider it from their side as well Mr. President, there have been a lot of reforms in Egypt."

"Oh yeah, and they're not the only ones," walking up to his globe he spun it once and jabbing his index finger heavily in the Middle East. "No less then 14 nations have gone through similar coops in the past 3 years, Egypt being the core of it all." His finger traced an invisible line, making a small circle, stretching from north Africa, around the former Yugoslavian territories, and as east as Pakistan, "All these nations but a few of our allies in the area, have either gone through a sudden change of government, or in some cases, being out right invaded!" his face no longer looking furious, but even in his calmer state, his bright red face was enough to give any unwary spectators enough to consider, piss this man off, and it's the last thing you'll do.

Pace nodded emotionlessly, in his time as chairman of the joint chiefs, and also with the job of being the president's top military advisor, he himself had seen, and in some case, experienced these changes in the Middle East first hand. Nations liberated by the US soon collapsed to a new regime, former enemies did the same, only for a new and more dangerous government to take their place, completely isolating themselves from the outside world…excluding of course, other like minded nations, Pace gave a grim look ,there was no way in hell this was a coincidence.

"I'll have our people look into it Mr. President."

The president nodded "See that you do General" reaching into his draw he pulled out a small silver device and waved it knowingly at the Marine General "Now if you'll excuse me, I'm off to see a test firing."

Watergate, Washington D.C. same time

Unlike the prepared and waiting President, General O'Neill was somewhat less then ready. Half dressed in his formal uniform, he himself was jumping up and down on one foot as he tried to put his sock on the other. He was mentally screaming that his wake up call didn't come, let alone his breakfast that he ordered the night before, and with his uniform not ironed like he ordered, he was having some not so small doubts about just buying an apartment instead.

'Damn uniform, my ass a BDU isn't proper clothing for a general! I did it for a year and no one complained' O'Neill thought grimly, as he grinned in success, taking the moment to admire his now covered foot, 'damn thing took 5 minutes, better make the most of it'

Meanwhile, a middle aged woman silently opening the door while pushing the somewhat oversized trolley, filled on each level with layers of toast, bacon, eggs and pancakes and rows of orange juice glasses. Slowly the trolley came to a halt at the small table in the suites lounge room, the woman slowly went over her list, removing the food that was ordered by a J. O'Neill.

By the time that all the food was laid, the hotel employee was wondering exactly where this O'Neill was. She dashed silently to the bathroom door, putting an ear against its wooden surface, she heard no rushing of water, nor did she feel the usual hot moisture that flowed up the door edges The woman knocked twice, awaiting a reply. She had safely concluded that the man was not in the bathroom that left only the bedroom.

Slowly approaching, she attempted to walk as quietly as possible, knowing that the wake up call was missed due to a power out in the area, she and hotel staff in general had been given their fair share of complaints already.

Knocking politely, she waited a response, she held a sharp yelp, probably in surprise, but what was more confusing was the strange sound afterwards, accompanied with the flash of light sleeping out the door frame. Curiously she opened the door, peeping through the growing opening, until she could see the room clearly….empty, except for two shoes spread across the floor.

USAF Theseus, 9:51 am Low Orbit above Nevada

High above the earth, the massive form of a Daedalus class Battlecruiser orbited the planet, if someone looked closely they would see a small white stream of light pulsing in towards the starship. While the US president and his body guards were making their way off the light blue panels that allowed their transportation, Hayes was shaking hands with the Theseus captain Colonel Williams, when they were both caught off guard by the sudden whirling sound and flash of light that accompanied any Asgard based transporter. The president's guards immediately reaching for pistols, Williams activating his zat, but before any of them could even aim at the flash, it quickly turned into a half dressed General O'Neill, sprawling on his back, jacket held tight in his right hand, and pants in the left.

Slowly he turned to look at the assembled people, the reactions on their faces mixed to say the least. From the straight, somewhat overly tense looks of the secret service agents, the embarrassed grimace on the ships captain, to the outright grin on Hayes face, it wasn't a comfortable thought.

Shifting his view to all the reactions, he responded in the best way he could ,"Ummmmm you know where I can get some shoes?"

White House, Washington D.C. same time

Surrounded the perfectly trimmed grass fields inside the home and office of whatever president ruled the nation, the presidents aide, Mark Thompson was in his own, somewhat smaller office, going over President Henry Hayes current alibi, suddenly disappearing from the white house, without a car was somewhat suspicious, and there was always one or two people constantly watching the presidents movements, mostly the media.

Underline with the closed pen, Thompson slowly read over what he typed up, "and as such, President Hayes was occupied with th…" the ringing of his office phone caught him off, dropping the pen, he picked up the receiver with his now free hand, he brought it too his ear "Thompson."

"Hello Mark." The voice was almost familiar, yet he couldn't think where.

"Who is this?" he asked curiously.

The voice seemed to chuckle slightly at the question "oh please Mark, surely you haven't forgotten me?", the aide scrunched his face in confusion, then it hit him, a sense of cold dead fear rushed over him at the memory.

He hesitated for several seconds, not finding the words to answer, blurting out unconvincingly "I told you I'm not helping you any more"

"Oh I know what you said, I remember it quite clearly." The voice said quite patronizingly, as if talking too a child., "but you were scarred, confused, years of working in such a strange new environment, it must have been overwhelming for you." Bullshit, Thompson thought, ones he left…that group, he made every effort to make amends for his previous mistakes.

With a little more conviction, he pressed the point "It's the same as before, I'm not helping you, enough people have been hurt from my actions." He himself feeling not convinced that was the only reason..

"I see" the voice sounded, genuinely disappointed, as if he expected Thompson to full heartedly side with him. "You know your sisters not been well lately I hear, possibly that new virus, you know the one that causes total inflammation of the blood vessels? Very painful I hear."

Instantly catching on, he was outraged, but kept his calm "You wouldn't…."

"Wouldn't what Mark?" the innocent reply came

The thought jumped in and out of his brain, should he? Two famous statements came too mind, The needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few, then the exact opposite, Family comes first. The whole thing was a constant debate, there was no right choice, nor was their a wrong one, each one suffered severe consequences, but he knew these bastards would probably kill his sister anyway, as sickening as the thought was too think

"Alright then!" he quickly broke, knowing full well all the consequences of his actions "What do you want?"

The mocking tone returned. "Oh? Why the sudden change of hear-"

"Just tell me what you want me to do! No more games!"

"Very well then." The voice took a deeply serious tone, no more playing around "In the 2nd draw to you're left, you will find a small device, you will use it to.." Thompson followed the instructions word for word, he only hoped that this wouldn't leave yet another mark on his soul…..

USAF Theseus

Staring out to the bridges reinforced windows, Hayes was admiring the view, the shadows of night that still cloaked half the planet, yet the majestic light of the sun blazed across the American surface, it was definitely awe inspiring, and the newly dressed general behind him had to agree.

Gone was the half dressed officers uniform, now clad in the more comfortable and functional BDU's of the Theseus's crew, O'Neill had a grin on his face as the president gave him a quick glance

"All set now general?" he asked with the smallest smirk on his face

'You bet, don't know how you live wearing one of those damn things every day.' O'Neill thought, looking at Hayes's suit "Yes sir, good to be out of the suit every now and again."

Raising an eyebrow at the statement "Thought it would have grown on you by now Jack."

O'Neill mentally rolled his eyes, even after 3 years, in his little still non-windowed office, the US military lost a few points in his opinion, the requirement of generals to wear dress uniform, was just one "you assume far too much…"he muttered, catching onto the presidents frown, he quickly added "Sir"

Colonel Williams watched the banter from the command chair, he couldn't hide the smile on his face, Brigadier Ronson always told the ship captains to watch out when O'Neill was aboard. A quick beeping cut his thoughts off, the comm. Officer nodded in his direction, guess it was time then.

Rising from his chair, he walked calmly to both of his superiors, giving a breath nod to them in the process "We just got the report from Nellis, Prometheus has finished the supply drop and is making its way into orbit to assume defensive status in our place."

That made O'Neill's dull face brighten up somewhat, as much as he liked the view, he was just 'dying' to see yet another big honkin' space gun go boom. "So we're going down?"

Williams nodded," As soon as the Prometheus launches, and our patrols are recalled, we'll head back to the dry-docks."

Clapping his hands together in a somewhat exaggerated way, the general replied, mostly with the growl in his stomach. "Excellent, now where's the mess hall on this thing? I kinda missed breakfast"

The President grinned knowingly, the colonel merely shrugged, "Airman?" he asked to the young woman assigned to aid the general.

"If you'll follow me sir." She said, as she led the general out of the bridge, leaving Williams giving a questioning look at the president.

Hayes was still grinning, catching the odd glance of f-302's gliding into the Daedalus class's hanger bay's, "You'll get used to it colonel, don't worry."


	3. Chapter Two The New World

Stargate Command, 25 minutes later.

Major General Hank Landry frowned yet again at the ever growing pile of reports. With the new international teams joining the already expansive US SG teams, his job was getting harder and harder by the day, sometimes he wondered if the facility should expand a bit, you know with the Russians and brits joinin…

"Unscheduled off world activation!" the small speakers hidden in his room blared to life, with what he could now recognize, as Sergeant Harriman's most spoken 4 words. Sighing, Landry dropped the latest Intel report of the Lucian Alliance's holdings near Dakara, and pushed himself out of the desk. Heading to the source of the constant screaming sound of the siren.

Walking from the warm and welcome conference table, to the cold and dark control room, he looked to the iris-closed Stargate, and the whirling, explosive sound of the incoming wormhole, leaving an almost beautiful blue light reflecting off the back wall of the gate room.

"Any signal Walter?" the general asked the man almost constantly in charge of all gate operations at the SGC. Harriman looked to a separate screen, watching the incoming IDC signal for a match. After recent improvements to the communication systems between SG teams and the SGC, the GDO's could now be used to indicate one of 4 situations, Radio Communication, Early EVAC, Emergency EVAC, or the worst possible scenario, Lock Gate Address. Thankfully the signal came clear, SG-32, requesting Radio Contact.

"It's the Primary British SG team sir, they weren't expected for another 3 hours." Harriman informed the general.

"Colonel Tobias leads that team right?" Landry asked, somewhat expecting the answer, the man definitely stood out from others, in duty and socially, you could hear him roar from the other side of the base.

Harriman nodded, bringing up a detailed view of the galaxy on the new main screen in the control room, it zoomed in on a section near Sol, and flashed a small white dot just a few hundred light years core-ward from earth. "Yes sir, they were scouting worlds near earth for a possible Naqudah mine, PX1-945, approximately 240 light years from us."

Unlike the previous commander of the base, Hank Landry took this all in with a stride, though he always wondered if Jack was just acting the part of village idiot. "Well lets here what they've found, patch us through the MALP."

With the press of a button, the main screen fizzled with static, slowly reforming into the image of yet another pine tree covered world, the MALP originally sent through the gate stayed to keep surveillance of the area, the idea was, if the constant signal from the MALP died, then the SG team were in for a world of trouble. Once the image cleared, and no one was on the scope, the General asked into the radio." Colonel Tobias, this is Landry, what have you found?"

Not getting a response, the control crew were starting to wonder what was going on, before a hand waved in front of the MALP from the left, with a quick scroll, the camera faced a grinning RAF Captain "This is Captain Winters sir, the Colonel is scouting ahead, looking for a plot, away from the pine trees, asked me too send the word of our recent success."

"A plot captain?" Landry asked with both a mix of confusion and amusement.

The captain smirked before continuing "he wants a house here sir, we've hit jackpot, Naqudah readings are off the scale, possible Trinium deposits too."

Landry's eyes widened with surprise, but quickly turned into a questioning glaze "Any enemy presence captain?"

The Captain Shook his head, "Not that were aware of, doesn't appear so at least , but this world is a goldmine, and from what Doctor Gerald's told us, there might be worlds nearby with the same level."

Now that got Landry interested greatly, maybe the US could profit from this as well. "Well then Captain, I think you should stay put for now, keep searching this world, we'll be sending additional support through the gate shortly."

Giving a final nod, "Will do sir, Winters out." And the captain disappeared from the screen, as the wormhole disengaged, leaving the gate room now doused in solely the normal white lights.

Landry straightened his shirt slightly, giving a final word to the gate technician "I'll ring Ronson, we'll get the Odyssey launched and to search this sector, can't let the brits hold everything can we?"

Harriman smirked at the statement "No sir."

Area 51-10.28 am July 27th 2008

In a semi-enclosed position in the massive facility, surrounded by consoles of various sorts, technicians both human and Asgard preparing the final phases of testing of the massive canon just outside the reinforced walls, Colonel Carter stood watching the rapidly approaching Theseus with no small amount of nervousness, sure its one thing to show General O'Neill yet another attempt at reverse engineering Asgard energy weapons, despite his somewhat deserving reluctance to come see it, hell last time the energy transformer miss calculated, and well…the results weren't quite up to expectations, that's if you don't count exploding as a successful test. But the President…that was something totally different and the somewhat strange calmness that both her Asgard colleagues were displaying only made it worse.

Thor quickly picked on her nervousness, it was quite distracting for him to say the least. "Colonel Carter, if you would like, Hermiod and I will prepare the test now while you welcome the delegation." The supreme commander suggested

Not quick to pick on the question, she asked dumbly "What?" the realization kicking in, she mentally kicked herself "Oh yeah" picking up her notes from the console that Thor seemingly wanted to use, she continued "Sure I'll head to the hanger bay to meet them now, sure you've got everything under control?"

"Do you doubt our capabilities colonel?" Hermiod questioned with noticeable impatience, walking from console to console, preparing the charge up cycle of the massive cannon, using the now not so strange 'stone' interface that the Asgard used. Frankly, this particular Asgard reminded her far too much of McKay, the fact that the two are constantly in contact with each other when the Daedalus was in Pegasus wasn't exactly a comforting thought.

"No it's just I was wondering if you would be ready in time." She said in her defence, not wanting another 'foolish humans, that's not how you do initiate an ion build up, or that's not the way to convert the particle flow' or some kind of crap like that. Personally she thought he was an arrogant prick of the highest order, quite a contrast to the patient and helpful Thor that's for sure.

The Asgard gave her a look of disgust, and barely opened his mouth before Thor gave him a distinct glare, and basically told him to 'know your place', turning to the colonel his expression softened to the normal neutral tone that was usually painted on his face, "We shall be ready for the test as scheduled, you may want to show several other advancements we have developed."

Carter nodded, "Right, see you in about an hour." She turned to head towards the fleet yards, with the Theseus now landing, and the roaring sound of its engines just barely hiding the two Asgards bickering at each other in their native language, leaving the few human technicians working with them, completely in the dark.

USAF Icarus, Orbit Above of P5S-117

Cruising swiftly above the forest world below, the latest of the Daedalus class was glided swiftly through the dark realm of space, when suddenly for its numerous point defence Railguns to jumped into action, spraying metallic bolts in seemingly random directions. Soon dozens of gliders appeared from virtually nowhere, countering the constant barrage of hyper-accelerated rounds with their own pulse fire, slamming into and washing against the previously almost invisible shield. Those that fired soon found themselves in the target sights of multiple Railguns, the heavily defended cannons fired an almost stream like assault of projectiles, slicing through the fighters like blades. On board the Icarus's bridge, things were intense. Originally just a scouting mission to one of Baal's Naqudah mines, it soon became a running battle. The Icarus, found itself still charging weapons and barely able to deploy shields against the unexpected enemy armada. 

With a single Ha'tak, multiple al'kesh and swarms of fighters, the Icarus was heavily out numbered but not out gunned. With its fighters launching, and defence cannons online, and with the occasional missile strike, this battle wouldn't be a push over for the attacking Jaffa.

Colonel Newkirk gritted his teeth at the last hit, shields were barely charged when they engaged, and now even the gliders were causing damage, not a happy feeling. An extra 3 squadrons from the surface moved in towards his ship, and he'd be damned if they even got close. "Increase railgun fire to the port side!"

"Turrets 4, 6 and 8 targeting several incoming gliders now sir, computer control." Captain Jennings reported from the weapons station on the colonels right, she was constantly adjusting target locks from all directions, so much for a nice quite shake down cruise…

Newkirk couldn't help but see the massive enemy starship, still launching more and more death gliders from a safe distance, no doubt aware of the advantage a 'Tau'ri' starship has one on one. Once that ship died, all these gliders would have no where to go…."Status on the main cannons?"

Jennings panel quickly switched from the railgun grid to the Asgard weapons station, showing 3 groups of 2 bars, slowly filling up from left to right with a green/blue colour, so far, it was barely 14 "Still charging, we jumped right into the fray."

The captain nodded grimly, looking intently at the ship acting as a carrier for this swarm, his own ship manoeuvring slowly through it while the Railguns offered some cover, "As soon as you've got the power for even a single shot, take out that Ha'tak!" Newkirk ordered over yet another hit to the ship, at least those big guns will make the difference, Prometheus couldn't even power its own at the battle of Antarctica, and firing missiles at a super Mothership? Well, not the smartest plan Hammond ever came up with, but then again there wasn't anything else.

The ever annoying and frustrating beeping from the sensor station behind him cut his thoughts off, the Helm officer the first to state the obvious "Sir, more al'kesh jumping in!"

The line of hyperspace windows opened in the distance, 5 extra Al'kesh joined the already large armada, 2 f-302's screamed across the main window, spraying their main cannon fire into anything in their path, and now was a good time to put them to use. "Order fighters to break and engage, load all anti-fighter missiles and prepare for saturation fire" The colonel ordered, already watching the human fighters breaking off from the main battle swerving into barrel rolls, extremely tight turns, and other manoeuvres that were hard to believe for those not understanding the gift of intertial dampener technology.

The Daedalus class was equipped with 24 VLS tubes, allowing the ship to fire different class missiles at a quicker rate then standard tubes, thankfully the current load out was split between anti-fighter, and anti-capital ship which did not requiring a time consuming reload of each tube and in Jennings case, made her job a hell of a lot easier. "Forward missile batteries 13-24 are loaded, ready to fire on your mark." She reported almost instantly at the order, already scanning the area of possible targets, not that hard considering there were nearly a hundred of the little bastards.

"Lock on all enemy Al'kesh, we'll mop the gliders with our light cannons, any word of the heavies?"

"Heavy Railguns are Primed and ready, PPC's 23 charged, we can get a single shot out of each within a few seconds."

"Bring us about, fire all missiles and prepare 4 mark 9 tactical Torpedoes, main guns to fire on my mark."

"Missiles away, heavy Railguns and PPC's on standby."

From 12 of the 24 VLS launchers, armoured flaps flipped back, allowing the small modified space AIM-120's to launch freely, spitting from the tubes almost simultaneously with a bellow of explosive force in their wake. The simple white rockets spread in separate directions at high speeds, streaking through the swarms of fighters, allied or enemy.

The newly arrived reinforcements barely had enough time to charge their shields, with the missiles spamming head on into the forward hulls, exploding spectacularly one after another. Meanwhile the Icarus herself was turning to face the capital ship, trawling madly with its Railguns in the process, point defences cutting into the surrounding fighters with an almost beam like rate of fire, the F-302's already firing their own missiles at the enemy 'corvettes' for lack of better words to describe the al'kesh.

Now the mighty Daedalus class Battlecruiser was turned and ploughing its way through the fighters like they were bugs on a wind screen. If the Railguns didn't get them, the whole slamming into a 400 metre starship did, by now the shields were fully charged and easily taking the beating that was thrown at it, but soon they'd have to face those Ha'taks heavy cannons, and that's a whole new ball game compared to gliders and al'kesh, but if they could stay out of its range for as long as possible…

"Weapons, fire everything we have at that thing!"

Area 51, Fleet Yard, Dock 8

There were literally hundreds of Engineers and Technician combing the layers of metal floors that rose like towers against the Spartan concrete walls that held the almost monolithic chamber together. Above was the grinding industrialized sound of the massive Titanium gates closing overhead, and while the hundreds of ship crews took it all without much notice, the President instantly covered his ears after leaving the sealed and relatively quite Theseus.

O'Neill barely raised an eyebrow in surprise, he was wondering whether or not he should have warned his CnC, but decided against it, much more amusing this way, and days like this, he needed a grin or two.

"Carter will be waiting for us just outside the yards." O'Neill yelled into the presidents ear, just over the loud thump of the doors slamming together, the sound echoing from wall to wall, Jack continued much quieter "You get used to it."

Before the president could reply, a quick cough caught the 2 delegates off guard, turning they faced the newly arrived Brigadier General Ronson, 'admiral' of the USAF Fleet, and usual commander of the fleet yards. Giving a quick salute to both. "Mr President, General." They both returned it swiftly, as the air force general sighed visibly, as if in relief "You have no idea how many times I've had to introduce myself today, to the brits, the Russians, the Chinese, and hell, I'd expect you both to arrive a lot earlier then them."

Hayes eyes grew slightly, "They're already here?"

Ronson gave a puzzled look, "Yes I thought you alrea…" but before he finished, both men and their escorts were half walking, half running in the direction of the research department, all the way O'Neill was thinking 'I do NOT envy carter at the moment…'


	4. Chapter Three The Political Playground

Atlantis, Pegasus Galaxy.

Floating above the darkened oceans, Atlantis glowed like a beacon against the night, towers reaching into the skies like majestic monoliths. In the city itself however, a few hundred metres north east from the main spire, a small bedroom's lights were still on when the occupants of its surrounding rooms had already called it a day.

In this room, a man in his mid 30's, with short brown hair and a pair of rounded glasses adorning his face, was pacing back and forth, going over yet another report on the growing 'confederation' that was slowly absorbing all worlds that were willing to fight against the wraith. No one had any idea how the Genii got their hands on a fleet of puddle jumpers, many of Atlantis's crew speculated they maybe found an ancient warship, maybe an uncharted outpost that survived the war. In any case, with these new additions, worlds rallied to their cause, Othella managed to repel the wraith attack on their world, and were the first to join the Genii, offering their expertise in advanced technology, and limited space fleet in preparations of a grand alliance.

"Too bad they're desperate enough to kidnap our people." The man mumbled, sub-consciously rubbing his face in the process. It hadn't been a good few years in Pegasus. While attacks on by the wraith have definitely slowed down, and thankfully, even countered by the Confederation, or given the chance, the Daedalus when it was here, it didn't take long for the Atlantis Expedition to catch on to the dozens of disappearances of SG teams. It came to a head when Major Lorne's team was captured, and any witnesses eliminated.

While the investigation of this mass disappearance continued, it all lead to the Genii, and their involvement. With the galactic wide news of a Genii puddle jumper fleet, and the knowledge of their lack of the ancient gene, it could only be one thing. They were forcing SG personal as canon fodder against the wraith. This lead to a massive incursion into Genii Prime, the Daedalus hovering like a great bird of prey over the planet, rapid beaming the captured Atlantis personal, while using unprecedented levels of restraint, left the Genii too themselves.

This merely furthered the 'Confederations' hostilities toward Atlantis, dozens of worlds that were former trading partners had suddenly forced an embargo against the great ancient city, getting others to do the same. Within months, Atlantis found itself in a completely hostile galaxy, a two front battle against forces that had numbers beyond belief. Their were hundreds of Hive ships in the galaxy despite earlier speculation, not to mention the even more numerous cruisers, and even more numerous darts that's constantly jumped in and out of the gate network. Then there was the confederation, nearly a hundred worlds under the Genii-Othellan banner, slowly building up primitive fleets, gathering scraps of wraith and ancient technology where ever they can find it. And in the middle of all this, was Atlantis, city of the Ancients, greatest technological find in all the known galaxies, was under control by a few thousand terran, and now Asgard engineers and scientists, mixed together with a hundred or so marines and air force personal, and on occasion, an advanced earth Battlecruiser, mixed with Asgard weapons and shields to give it that much more of a punch.

But all in all, numbers like that couldn't be ignored, at least not until earth can spare the resources to partake a major offensive and liberation across Pegasus, and until then, they had to hope that these two sides will be battling against each other, and not Atlantis.

Those thoughts left him, unaware that his door was open, the expedition leader walked in quietly, "Doctor Jackson?" she almost whispered, interrupting him from his mumbling of external threats and the like.

Shifting his eyes from the report, he smiled briefly "Elizabeth." Before going to back to his report, half interested.

"I see your well on your way with packing." She said sarcastically at the pile of half backed duffer bags lining near the door.

Jackson shrugged briefly, closing the booklet and chucking it to its already overcrowded desk. "Well I've still got another 12 hours till the gate to earth, might as well finish going over these details that got the pentagon all worked up about." He said a bit distracted, eying back and forth from report to report.

The doctor eyed him cautiously, a bit amused at his constant attempts at work "Ah" walking towards him, she snatched the bundle of pages from him, her small smirk was quickly wiped off as soon as she read the title. "The confederation I see." She said dryly, sighing as she practically threw the report across the room in frustration. Jackson couldn't exactly blame her. "Looks like I'm not the only one that feels this way." He commented to his superior, now sitting down on his lounge, he handed her another report.

Over her initial outburst, she accepted the bundle of papers, at quick glance it was a request for additional military forces, in particular, another starship "you think we'll be given additional reinforcements?"

Daniel shrugged, "Well with things at home cooling down, chances are another ship or two might come our way."

And those words brightened Weirs days that much more, "That's good to hear, perhaps now we can explore the outer rim." Daniel had to agree, not only that, it would strengthen Atlantis's military influence in Pegasus, as well as make trade easier between earth and the city.

Rising from the lounge, she picked up one of the bags "In any case, you should stop going over reports that are directed to me, and start " shoving the heavy storage bag at him "packing." finishing with a curt smile "we both know full well you need this vacation."

Area 51, Outside Fleet Docks

Just outside the growing dry-dock, a nervous look creped its way across Samantha Carters face, both British and American delegates weren't much an improvement either.

"This is completely unacceptable!" The French representative, Jean LaPierre practically screamed at the obviously unprepared Colonel Carter, the Russian and Chinese delegates not hiding their agreement either.

Brigadier Chekhov nodded grimly," This goes against the IOA Treaty." not noticing the British delegate's eyes rolling.

Former NID agent, now US representative of the IOA, Richard Woolsey, scoffed at the statement, "Really general, then I could easily ask about these new laser weapons your government has developed and shared with the Chinese."

The general smirked, "It was merely further research into current electron laser technology, while Goa'uld technology has increased their effectiveness somewhat, they are not technology gathered from off-world, and as such are not included in the treaty."

The British ambassador was not impressed "The idea of this treaty is that all technology that could be used to united earths defences is put in IOA hands." Russell Chapman, shook his head, "Isn't it obvious if your not willing to share, then by every right the US does not have too either?"

Shen Xiaoyi, the Chinese ambassador spoke for the first time, "Technically yes", turning to narrow her eyes Woolsey, obviously the American representative was not in her good books, "but as the technology originated off-world, it is automatically brought under IOA jurisdiction."

"Wrong ambassador." A quite, but powerful voice said from the opposite end of the room, everyone turned to face its direction, seeing a none too happy president, escorted with an equally annoyed major general.

Xiaoyi glared slightly despite herself "With all due respect mister president, this Ion Cannon is making my government more nervous then when you released that Mark Nine of yours."

"It will only be used as a planetary defense weapon, and possibly on larger starships like the Daedalus Class." Carter injected

"You mean the ship that you refuse to give to my government?" Chekov asked

Haye's tried to be diplomatic about, but couldn't help but have a snide edge to his tone "Yes general, despite your constant requests for the ship, we've turned you down for the reason that you're spreading off-world technology to the highest bidder."

The Russian scoffed, ignoring the surprised glances from the French and Chinese ambassadors. "Preposterous."

"Not according to our diplomats in the Kremlin, hell you've given a squadron of your sabers to the Iran's!"

"I assure you Mister President, that this is an obvious twist of the truth by your spies." Smiling quite smartly at the presidents scowl, "Besides, even if we were to offer our technology, it would be for the greater advancement of mankind, I believe you're aware of this also, the name Carrington Institute would ring any bells?" That's when bloody drained from the president's face. Doctor Daniel Carrington, head off the research and development facility simply called the 'Institute' for the most part, was recently contacted by the government, and brought into the highly secretive truth of the interstellar community. He was hired to slowly filter advanced technology into the public domain, in preparation for disclosure, a job that he and his organization was doing quite well, already on the market was holographic technology, going along with Colonel Carters demonstration 3 years ago.

O'Neill rolled his eyes "Oh please, we know you've given it to religious zealots that given the chance would send those things over the Israeli border within minutes, they'll eat them apart."

"Just like how you're offering the F-302 schematics to the Canadian and Australian governments?" Xiaoyi commented seemingly off-handed

"Both who have been debriefed and brought into the IOA as junior members and as such have every right to the technology we've given to you also." Chapman said for the President

"Merely because they're your allies?" LaPierre injected

"Because they have both been…." The president was cut off by a muffled roar from the docks. The group turned to look at what just happened.

In the far distance of the chamber, near the original docks, the formerly powered down, and locked Daedalus class, was rising from its open bay, the anti-grav engines resonated a load humming sound as it climbed vertically from the docks, and into the open skies.

Meanwhile, 4 Kilometres outside Area 51

Across the third and final hill of his patrol, a seemingly inconspicuous 'cammo dude' known as Adrian Wright, lowered his rifle for a quick sight at the massive, yet mostly underground facility. Security had gotten even tighter then normal in recent years, the policy of 'shot on sight' was seriously in effect, and the over all boundary of Nellis was an additional 4 kilometres in every direction. Not only that, but EG&G, the company that provided security for area 51, had recently been hired for another facility in Arizona, one that had actually stayed top-secret, earning itself the unofficial title of Area 53. Whenever asked what the hell area 52 was, everyone just shrugged 'NORAD perhaps?'

But the security officer had little concern for the US's other projects, he took this position to finally get the information his employers wanted. So far, he had only been sent on patrols on the outer barriers, today was his first up close. It was nothing impressive, an airfield, no more

"Nice view ain't it?" A rough and somewhat veteran voice echoed his sarcasm. He turned to face his 'partner', an Oklahoman by the name of Geoff Gardner, 38 year old family man. In his recent time as a security guard, Gardner has took him under his wing, taught him why Area 51 suddenly had went all paranoid with security, more then usual that is.

'Spaceships' the older man told him a few weeks ago, 'Big ones at that, some bigger then those super aircraft carriers. While this could have been a joke played on the newbie, other guards told him the same thing. Still skeptical though, what he saw in the skies the next week changed his world completely. Rising above the hills, a trio of identical ships, definitely human design, floating through means unknown, blaring the names proudly _Victory, Annihilator, Supremacy_. Each ship giving off a flash of their twin engines before quickly fading into nothingness.

That amazing scene got him interested, as it would too any unsuspecting viewer, 'Started happening 6 or 7 years ago, first there was one of those things, now there's at least a dozen of them buzzing back and forth, as well as at 52.'Gardner explained, going over the minor details that he'd picked up over the years 'there's even the odd fighter launch, heard years back that one of the computers went berserk, and flew on path towards god knows where.' Adrian nodded, often seeing them fly by himself, in small squadrons on and off, even the odd cargo ship.

And now today, he saw exactly where these majestic machines arose from. The relatively quiet runway, held nothing really out of the norm from any airbase, albeit some obviously more advanced craft. F-117's were the main craft there, though a few obviously stood out. A strange helicopter like craft, missing the main rotor, but instead had two smaller fans sticking out on each side, as well as a slick black triangle like craft, about the size of a b-2.

"That thing there your looking at is the Aurora, not really used much these days, but back a decade or so it was the fastest thing in the sky." Geoff said, the advanced looking machine was brought out for what seemed to be a test flight, half a dozen engineers and two pilots examining the strange plane.

"What is now?" He asked

Geoff eyebrows rose slightly at the question, he looked back to the vast airfield, seemingly searching for something "There," pointing at a row of five strange aircraft, their wings swooped forward, and the craft itself was very compact compared to modern designs. "F-302 class, you've seen them, they launch at least once a week."

The guard was unimpressed "They don't go too fast from what I've seen."

Geoff snorted at the remark "Well going hyper-sonic in an area where conspiracy nuts are pitching tents, ain't exactly the smartest idea." The guard grinned at the thought, Geoff did the same but a growing rumble in the background caught their attention. "Hand on a tick.."

"What's going on?" The younger man asked

Geoff didn't know exactly for sure, the only thing that could be making such a noise would be…"Ah….." the realization only grew when we saw the metallic surface a mile away split apart ever so slowly "Your about to see one of the big birds fly, kid."

The doors were reaching a massive distance apart, it had to be at least several hundred metres, it was absolutely monstrous, not even those massive ships he saw weeks ago would need something that large to fit, but now he saw exactly what did. Slowly rising, he saw the peak of a ship, a massive flat panel covered with small weapons emplacement and communication relays. It continued to rise, revealing its entire form. The 400 metre monolith hovered gracefully above the now empty bay, it was monstrous, and the two words that could describe such a scene were thus "Holy shit."

Geoff grinned, "got that right" he pointed to the blazing white logo on the port side, BC-03 "That there is the Odyssey, been around for bout 3 years now, just a second and you'll see her disappear," as if on schedule, the massive vessel warped and blended into the skyline, leaving but an extremely bare outline that could only be seen as the ship moved off into the sky.

Adrian's eyes were still wide at the scene, barely registering Geoff's slap on his shoulders "come on kid, we've still got work to do." Before marching back down the hill and too the large four wheeled drive they were using on their patrol. Wright sighed, another days work, at least he got something interesting to show for it, sub-consciously holding the active camera phone in his left hand.

USAF Icarus

"FIRE!" Newkirk bellowed out the order is sequence with massive charge up taking place through the ship. Soon energy focused into 3 specific locations. The build up gathered into almost minuscule locations, converted almost instantly into an ionized charge of incredible power. The build up was enormous, almost unstable, but with a simple push of a button, it was released. All within a micron.

Out of 3 turrets, twin bolts of ionized particles erupted forward. Enemy's in its path wisely maneuvered away, leaving empty space for the 6 blue pulses to move swiftly towards their target. The efficient weapons allowed no ions to break the magnetic field holding them together, as such they looked like perfect blue diamonds slicing through the darkness of space.

By now the Ha'tak was beginning to respond, barely moving thanks to their false feeling of safety away from the battle. Shields up and weapons blazing uselessly at the distant US starship. Dozens upon dozens of enemy plasma bolts fired in return, but it was ultimately useless, the fire from the Icarus had hit. Twin bolts slammed into the Ha'taks shields, the magnetic fields collapsed on impact, allowing the highly powerful energy to wash over the shields, almost collapsing them with the first hit. But not even seconds later, 4 more bolts hit, and for the most case, ignored the faint layer of energy still surrounding the Ha'tak. The impact across the armour forced the ship to lose its position, being thrown slightly in the opposite direction, but the worst part was when it literally melted into the ship. Entire sections were blasted away, leaving a molten metal outlying where the blast hit, pouring the liquid into space like a bleeding wound.

The return fire was swiftly avoided, the Daedalus Class Battlecruiser turned on its axis, pouring power to its ion drives and easily dodged the swarm of plasma pulses .By now the Icarus's bridge crew were cheering, grins covered every crewman's face. This was there first cap-kill, and hell, the quickest any starship has even gotten one in their service, even the Daedalus spent a few weeks on her trial runs before jumping to Pegasus for the Battle of Atlantis. But now there was a fleet of gliders and al'kesh buzzing around in the hundreds, and personally, Newkirk didn't have the patience to take them out with Point Defense weapons. "Recall all fighters, Helm prepare for a hyper-jump to earth."

"Aye sir, plotting hyperspace jump."

Amiss the savage brawl that surrounded the starship, the Railguns renewed their furious strike, giving its still full compliment of fighters the cover they needed to dock. Several gliders that tried to follow the F-302's on their return run were quickly locked in the sights of the Icarus's forward heavy railgun, the newly developed anti capital ship weapon. The small group of enemy fighters was ripped apart by the explosive rounds that split and fragmented with force that was designed to cut through enemy capital ships shields and armour. While the level of firepower the Icarus was pouring out in every possible direction, it wasn't enough. One small group of 6 gliders charged in, careful to avoid the constant streams of munitions targeting their comrades in the distance. Railguns constantly locked and relocked on enemies, but in the midst of battle, they only just locked on when it was too late. 500 metres from the Battlecruiser, they fired uselessly at the suicidal fighters, only forcing the fighters to become a fireball on impact. The pilots sacrifice fulfilling the will of their god.

The bridge was in a small order of chaos, the hit too the shields rocked the entire starship, slowly forcing it too compensate with its internal dampeners and limited secondary thrusters. Colonel Newkirk slowly raised himself back into the command chair, now wearing far more bruises then he did before. "Damage report!"

Weps quickly ran over the ships systems, leaving him with clenched teeth as the ship took more and hits across the board "Port shield emitters are down to 42 and dropping, minor damage to the outer armour and 3 of our Railguns are knocked out"

"And this was supposed to be an easy scouting mission" Newkirk said to himself sarcastically. He opened his mouth to order the next plan of action, but yet another massive surge of energy ripped into the weakened shields, throwing the crew in their chairs yet again. "That's it then," Newkirks barely strained voice announced, quickly ordering "bring us about, how many mark nines do we have?"


	5. Chapter Four Superweapons

Area 51, Shipyard

The now quite room of officials and military personal, perhaps a little too silent for most peoples taste, "I thought no more ships were gonna launch today?" O'Neill asked quite dumbly, but at least it starts conversation.

"Well apparently the SGC have found something of interest, they want to check the area fully." Carter responded

"What about the gate?" the general countered

"It's a big area sir, couple dozen star systems." She tried to explain, despite the Generals sigh.

"Carter we can use the gate more then once" He said thinking it was one of the most obvious facts in the universe. Too bad he was wrong.

"There're only 4 gates in the sector Sir, we want to search the entire area." The colonel answered matter of factly, though not hide the smug feeling of superiority. While she could understand being out-smarted, she wouldn't accept being out-smarted by something so simple, at least not by the General at least.

O'Neill himself however, was slightly embarrassed, no more then usual though when it comes to be proven wrong. "Oh," he said simply, willing to leave the conversation there and then, trying to ignore the slight snicker he was receiving by the president of all people.

The colonel herself couldn't hide her smirk, but she spared the General any more embarrassment "Anyway, on with the tour." Carter lead the delegates through the hall way. Passing by rooms of great and small sizes, experiments of equal diversity took place. From a transport-beam unit being refitted into the base's systems, to further experiments in cold-fusion technology based on Asgard principals. Within a few minutes of walking, they found themselves in Area 51's primary off-world technology R and D department, now the Colonel was leading them into a relatively small room, only connected to the outside world by a reinforced titanium door, that if needed, could be locked down due to the many possible outbreaks that could happen in such a risky business of examining unknown and dangerous alien technology.

The room itself was bland and Spartan, concreted from the floor to ceiling, only decorated by a few random computer panels, a large bunker door to the rear, and a small device, behind it a reinforced wall. Currently there were 2 other scientists working back and forth between the device and the computers, Carter quickly joined them for the demonstration.

The British ambassador was the first to get impatient with the lack of knowledge "Colonel, what exactly is this?"

The scientists, who had obviously been waiting for the group, began on Carters nod. Doing a small amount of fiddling on the device, and its surrounding computer interfaces, a small hum built up, growing in any increasingly annoying whining sound. "This here is the prototype shield emitter, the generator itself is few doors down." The colonel whispered into O'Neill's ear, earning a mild shrug in reply. With a few more buttons, the emitter spewed out a glowing orange layer of energy towards the blast door, the transparent field occasionally flashed with a white bolt of light, rapidly growing until it touched from wall to wall of the room. On this Carter grinned "We call it the Firestorm Grid."

The president mused it over a bit, somewhat oblivious to the many curious and intrigued faces behind him "at least its original."

"Hmmmm, in all honesty however, our variation seems to be much more effective." Chekov added smugly, referring to the already field tested 'Iron Curtain' defense grid. Like the Firestorm, the Iron Curtain deployed dozens of emitters across a ships hull, which then in turn created a network of small theatre shields, instead of one massively overlaying bubble that both Asgard and Goa'uld designs used.

This concept allowed one massive advantage, focused defense. Instead of dispersing fire across the entire shield, energy could be focused into certain sections, like weapon emplacements, hanger bays, or engines, at the sacrifice of an overall weakened grid, it was unfortunate that while Asgard shields used multiple emitters, power was cycled evenly; it was something many of their engineers were reconsidering.

However the main advantage of both designs was that they used earth based materials, and could be relatively easily mass produced, finally allowing earth the capability to take full advantage of shield technology, just like their significant steps to an independent Hyperdrive, as shown with many of the Prometheus and Victory class.

"Well better or not General, we both all better take full advantage of these things, since it's likely that the Asgard can't keep giving us their shields and weapons forever." Carter explained the situation that everyone was full aware off. When production of ships started to expand massively, the Asgard were already becoming strained to constantly refit the human ships, it got to the point that a human designed Hyperdrive was developed to fill the void, now that the Asgard only offered their inter-galactic Hyperdrive to Daedalus class ships, and they knew weapons and shields won't be far behind.

The in-base speakers cracked to life "Colonel Carter, Thor and Hermiod are ready for you."

Carter smiled politely to the delegates "well it seems we're ready, if you'll follow me to the test sight."

USAF Icarus

The mighty Daedalus class manoeuvred further more into the maelstrom of battle, its small group of fighters reluctantly returning to their nest. The ships weapon officer had the joint duty of tactical and secondary sensor operations. It was him that informed the colonel, "Cobra Leader has entered the bay sir, we're clear to jump."

Newkirk nodded briefly, still amongst the minor bumps and shocks of enemy fire "Very good." Flicking on the small switch on his console he spoke through the ships internal speakers "Engineering, status?"

Down in the depths of the starship, the Engineering room was not free from the constant disturbances plaguing the bridge. The half a dozen human, and sole Asgard engineer were working frantically, ranging from stabilizing the hyperspace window generator, to cycling energy through the shield grid.

Lieutenant Jennifer Bradley was no different, the head engineer was now helping the Asgard prepare the final teleportation coordinates, at least Vindar was much more cooperative then the Daedalus Asgard rep, Novak often told her about the little prick, and was pleasantly surprised with Vindar's helpful attitude. Taping into her small headset, she reported "Sir, Vindar says we're ready to deploy on the mine on the final pass, detonation will be 10 minutes, none the less we'd want to be in hyper when it goes off."

Back on the bridge, Newkirk grinned slightly at the thought, he intended to be at least a couple dozen light years when that thing detonates, the problem with the mark nine was its sensitivity, if launched for a almost instant detonation like the Daedalus did against the Wraith years ago, the weapon could pre-maturely detonate inside the ship itself, and that wouldn't be the greatest tactic ever considered "Acknowledged Lieutenant.", he took one final look at the scene of chaos that was fixed in front of him, like any old sci-fi show. Still, the dozens of Railguns spewed their projectiles into the void, still the enemy poured their own fire in return, now was time to leave this "helm jump at your discretion, destination, Earth extreme orbit." The colonel ordered, never taking his eyes of the battle.

"Aye sir, window is forming." Helm ordered, as the Icarus turned ever so slightly, changing the view of the battle back to the starlight backdrop of space. The ship accelerated rapidly, leaving the enemy further and further behind with every second. As soon as it left the planetary gravity well, the rift into hyperspace burst to life, not a kilometre in front of the Icarus, the ship plunging head first into the superluminal conduit, leaving the system for good.

But not before leaving a little going away present.

Al'kesh, Conveyer of Divinity

The Jaffa and human pilots roared in victory, the comm. Channels filled with battle cries and thanks to their god for this glorious defeat of the Tau'ri starship. This retreat from Lord Baal's territory is but one of the few successful defences against Tau'ri assault, and only proved to strengthen their devotion in Baal, and his glorious crusade to unite the galaxy under his holy banner.

These Jaffa were the next generation species of his seemingly diminishing domain, a recent influx to fill the gap the Jaffa rebellion made in the mass heresy that affected all Goa'uld Empires. They were the first of the new born, those who shed their humanity aside to become Baal's chosen sons and daughters.

Tr'ay was one such warrior, placed on the sensors of the aging al'kesh corvettes that filled every fleet's ranks, in this case, one of the thousands of mercenary ships that patrolled the outskirts of the empire and beyond. The ships weapons 'officer' for lack of better term, was glorifying himself across the comm. channel, boasting on how it was his ship that forced the enemy away. There were many disputes to the claim, and Tr'ay had no want to get into the verbal war that was raging on. She preferred to continue her work, knowing that she could better serve her lord Baal, she was the true devoted warrior, unlike these rambling fools that clung too tightly too their humanity that was supposedly stripped from them.

By now the slobs were digging their way into the hidden supplies of liquor that were smuggled into the supplies from Stepur'as, a growing trade centre on the outskirts of Baal's domain. "Disgusting" she muttered, her own voice muttered out by the growing screams and bellows behind the bridge. This was the life of a freelancer.

She yearned for the days of being in the Goa'uld Grand Fleet, the growing forces that protected the Inner Systems. The Fleet, and the Grand Army that accompanied it, was the true military force of the Goa'uld Empire, utilizing up to date technology, actually trained and disciplined in the ancient arts, unlike this rabble bunch that were pulled from their homes, genetically altered ,given a staff weapon and ordered to shot anyone that defies Baal's will. This wasn't even considering the Guardians of Tuat, the Elite Forces that guarded the capital world of the Empire, Baal's personal body guards, the holy defenders of Tuat. And yet she was stuck here, thrown into the growing guilds of mercenary's since there

"Such is the life of a crew of a mercenary." A voice empathically followed her train of thought, she turned around to see the warmly smiling face of her commanding Jaffa, the ships master, Dre'vac.

She knew the old man was the only person on the relatively small crew that actually knew what they were doing, especially considering he was once in the Royal Navy himself, dropped for not destroying a defenceless rebel Jaffa cargo ship, dropped himself from a prestigious position as ship master of the new Ju'Garq Heavy Cruiser into this bucket of bolts, filled with a crew that barely knew the difference between a Hyperdrive and a door lock. "I'm beginning to wonder why I was thrown in with these fools."

What was even more insulting to her honour as a warrior was that the Divinity wasn't even a true warship, a heavily modified al'kesh that was more cargo carrier, then the gunship it was designed to be. The old fleet ships were slowly being sold into the private sector, gliders, al'kesh, even Ha'taks could be owned by those with the right amount of currency, which were for the most part Naqudah slips.

The elderly Jaffa continued to smile, "Well do you want the honest answer, or the one you want to hear?"

"Obviously the truth old man." She said with no small amount of scorn as she continued her search for survivors.

"Well then, simply put, you're a new born, and you should know full well how 'open minded' the elders overseeing applicants at the academies are." The master said sarcastically as he took a seat in the unoccupied weapons station.

Tr'ay snorted "Typical.", she and many others of her kind were much more open minded then the old loyalists that filled the bulk of Imperial Navy, who constantly looked down on new borns, female new borns in particular. Then she noticed something odd. "Master Dre'vac…" she said, pointing curiously to the small device that suddenly appeared on sensors.

He stumbled slightly, reaching out for the computer panel. "Its smaller then an escape pod that's for sure." Musing over the device in the far distance. "Any noticeable energy readings?"

"Minimum, but I didn't even detect it off the initial scans." She quickly ran a detailed analyse of the small object, the holographic HUD zoomed in to create a high detailed image, "There was another jump in energy build up just then, its going in stages."

This piped the old mans interest ,"What materials are you detecting."

"It seems to be made of a Titanium/Trinium alloy, and an unknown material." Well not quite unknown, but certainly different from the norm, there were rumours of a strange material the Tau'ri used, for unknown purposes.

"Anything specific?" Dre'vac asked with much more concern then before.

"We'll I'm not certain, but it looks like Naqudah…but isn't?"

The masters eyes shone with realization, if only for a second "Activate the Hyperdrive"

"What?" the young new born asked confused

"Do it!" the order was very forceful, and Tr'ay knew full well not to question the old man when he gave an order. She quickly engaged the drive, setting course for the nearest possible outpost, while the Master was activating the comm. channel "Brothers, Sisters, we must all retreat immediately, there is a weapon of incredibly destructive power in the middle of our fleet, if we do not leave the area, we will be consumed in the Tau'ri's most powerful weapon." He quickly deactivated the system as soon as he finished, not willing to be victim to the slurs and whines of a drunken crew that the old man was telling stories.

Tr'ay jammed in the final coordinates into the ships system, Ieran'vec, a nearby mining colony, not much but it will do for the Divinity's needs "Course plotted, what if the others don't follow?"

Grim determination masked the masters inner feelings of guilt, but it all turned to the knowledge that these men were fools of the highest order, unworthy of being cargo dealers that they are, let alone Baal's personal warriors that they thought they were "It is unfortunate, but if they can not go past their pig-headedness then it their own loss," though he knew his words were true, the guilt of leaving these men and women, ignorant fools or not, slashed into his very soul "May the lord Baal forgive us" he murmured in prayer, before giving the order ".jump to hyperspace."

The al'kesh plunged right into the depths of hyperspace, not looking back for a second. Those that did not heed the master's words looked onwards, as their sensor stations picked up a massive jump of energy, watching as the suddenly sober men and women saw the most beautiful scene in their lives. They saw naught but light.

Area 51

The massive half buried warehouse was connected to the vast networks of research stations, test sights, and hanger bays that made up area 51 and Nellis Airbase as a whole. Unlike other such facilities however, such as the one that housed the recently initiated Project Mammoth, the development facilities for the Hammerhead and Maverick craft, not to mention the dozens of small rooms that held projects of one sort or another, it was unique, if only just because of two of its occupants. The two head engineers were far from human, standing at barely 4 foot tall, a strangely grey coloured skin, not to mention the whole lack of clothes thing going on, it was a strange sight to get used too, especially for the half a dozen human engineers and scientists working on the project with them, even after 5 years of working with the Asgard, it was somewhat unnerving to work under their thoughtful gaze.

But not only because of its occupants, was the room unique from the other test sights. The warehouse, as it was known as, merely for its sheer size, was missing a large slit of its northern wall, just below eye level, seemingly exposing the room to a vast field of grass and dirt, but if one looked closely they could see the gentle ripple of blue light, a simple refit Tok'ra force field.

Now the delegates found themselves in said room, lead by the female colonel that made every effort to look right at home, the ambassadors and other government officials stood eyebrows raised at the scene. Massive computers, both human and Asgard in design, as well as spare generators, tools of strange and alien design, covered the reinforced concrete walls and floor, leaving only a relatively small section clear of the mess.

But as per usual, everyone's eyes were drawn away from the careless placement of technology, and to the operators themselves. Those unfamiliar with the race, gazed at the Asgard curiously, the two physically identical beings, they returned the gaze, and it was easy then to see how the two differed. One looked impassive, as if he had expected and acknowledged this treatment without so much as a care, but the other who was ignoring them completely, living by the old words mentioned by Doctor McKay 'He hates it when you stare.'

Soon the impassive one approached the newly arrived humans, nodding briefly but respectfully at the officials" Colonel Carter, everything is prepared for the test fire, we merely await your signal."

Sam grinned, she walked to consoles with Thor asking quietly "Are the stealth systems ready to activate?"

"The field is currently at a 500 metre radius, and is capable of reaching a maximum of 4 kilometres for a 2 hour period." He replied, giving the full details as usual, as they both did the final calibrations.

"Good, looks like we're all set." She walked back towards the delegates, indicating for them to follow her as she walked towards the shield in front of the grass field.

They stood in a line, all starring out through the slip of daylight that poured through the shielded window. The seconds passed and Jacks curiosity got to better of him to longer he stared out into the empty plain. "Sooooo Carter." He looked to the woman to his left, "where's my space gun?

She smirked, pointing out a few kilometres "Right there sir"

"Where?"

"There"

"Carter, all I see is grass and dirt"

"Then look now O'Neill" Thor said while moving a final crystal into place. Suddenly from miles away, a wash of almost invisible energy moved in all directions at supersonic speeds, completely engulfing the warehouse they were in, and revealing something different from what anyone expected.

Instead of the open barren landscape that filled their view mere seconds beforehand, a giant silver metal ring itched into the a concrete foundation, it held twin supports, and multiple hydraulic beams, that in turn held up without a doubt, the largest cannon ever seen. It was at least 40 metres, armoured in multiple layers of Trinium/titanium alloy but still partially exposed in certain areas, revealing the advanced systems within .The end of the cannon was locked and held in place horizontally in a small station dozens of metres away from the ring itself. While gazing out at the weapon, everyone could instantly sum it up in one word, massive.

"I think that's thing you're looking for General." Hayes muttered dumbstruck at the monstrous weapon.

HMS Hood, Hyperspace

Commodore Terrance Langley stood as the expansive window of his starship, constantly watching the spiralling energies of hyperspace with mild interest. Being only the 5th week the Hood had been in service, and only the 7th interstellar mission, it was still hard to get over the amazing dance of light that welcomed any person able to make the stellar transition. They were pulled away from their recent exploration to Hebridian space, a comm. message from home told them they have a new assignment, a hunt if you would to the Sirius Sector. Just minutes ago, the ship made an early exit from hyperspace, swung around and plunged right into the abyss, headed right for the world of discovery itself.

Though there was time for sight seeing, and it wasn't now, there was work to be done if the United Kingdom were to claim a world for themselves. Langley walked calmly towards the navigation station behind the command chair, watching the half a dozen officers map the nearby space with assistance from Narvri manning the sensors in engineering "Lieutenant Welling, I need an estimate on the Odyssey's time of arrival in the Sirius sector and their destination." He asked the young woman staring intently at the known flight path of the US Warship.

"Well the path they're heading is different from ours, they'll be exiting at the centre of the system, in 46 minutes while were a bit further towards the outskirts." The map zoomed out to show the two flight paths, several dozen light years away from each other. "Unfortunately they will arrive at their point 4 hours before us, but seems that they'll be sticking around there little area for a while, I'd say we're clear for our world."

The thought continued to roam about him the Commodores head, it seemed that everyone might get a piece of the cake then, it's really a matter of who got the bigger slice. "None the less, put as much power to the engines as possible, the rules of colonization still applies in the interstellar realm you must realise."

"Oh?" Welling asked curiously, "What rules are they sir?"

Langley moved from the navigation station to his waiting station "Oh its Just the one" resting comfortably in the command chair, a smirk covered his face "finders keepers."

Ion Cannon Control Facility

"Initiating primary power transfer." Hermiod reported dryly, it was the only warning that the on-lookers received. The cannon's locks deactivated, the mighty barrel rose skywards, the screeching sounds of the hydraulics roared towards the viewers.

"Targeting systems activated." The Asgard continued, eyeing the holographic displays as a giant shimmering globe of earth appeared for nothingness.

Soon an array of dots appeared in a line from the surface outwards into space "Weapon is locking on." Hermiod went one in his drone like voice, but despite it could not hide his own interest in the device. Everyone watched as the cannon slowly rotated on its turret, its bulb-like tip seemed to lightly crackle with blue energy as it locked into place.

"Weapon is charging" the alien engineer stated the obvious, "75 and rising" the light crackle grew to intense bellows of blue light that continued to grow more powerful with each passing second.

"This is it." Carter said through clenched teeth.

The Generals eyebrows rose "What? Think its going to blow up like the last ones?" he said sarcastically, receiving a small knowing smile in reply

And then, the words that everyone was expecting, were mentioned calmly by the operator "the weapon is firing."

But ironically, as if the universe had a twisted sense of humour, at the exact same moment, mere seconds from earth in the path of the target, the helmsmen of the Icarus uttered the words "Exiting Hyperspace."


	6. Chapter Five

Authors Notes- After finally leaving a state of seemingly never ending procrastination, I've finally decided to update this fic, have to thank Ash's Boomstick in particular for helping me out with many ideas for this chapter, and those to come. Anyway, on with the story.

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Chapter Five-Why not to screw around with super weapons.

Area 51, Weapons Control

"The weapon is firing" The cold emotionless words of Hermiod echoed through the both static and silent chamber, the only thing filling the cavernous warehouse was the collective tension emitting from each audience member, moments before the titanic weapon nearly 2 kilometres away discharged a silent, yet powerful beam of ion charged energy streamed high into the atmosphere, the very air burned blue from its raw, energized power. Carter watched the mixed reactions with proud amusement. The audience of ambassadors and other officials painted their expressions vividly, some were shocked, a few amazed, others simply curious, but all were impressed, if only by the sheer power. By now the beam had reached low orbit and rapidly climbed further still, if this was an example of what earth was capable of design, then a planetary defence grid was well within possibility.

It took a lot to truly shock General Jack O'Neill, the first activation of the Stargate, the revelation of the Goa'uld and their influence in human history, that Maggie was the one that shot Mister Burns, things that radically changed the way he thought about life , this was one of the few among them. His face was locked frozen with an expression that was between disbelief and awe, his eyes tracking from the gargantuan fixture itself to streak of light it was emitting into the distance. He honestly had no faith that this thing would work, hell he constantly thought it was going to fizzle out, collapse and then explode for good measure like the near half dozen other attempts. Yet seeing first hand this monstrous device let out a silent roar of fury, well….lets just say it quickly changed that theory.

It fired its deadly discharge in an almost graceful way, instead of the deep echoing bellow of an Asgard pulse cannon that slammed into its unfortunate foe with colossal force, it seemed to lance out like a blade, slicing through the air with precision. If anything it was earth's rapier to the asgards claymore, both designed for the same ultimate goal, but each accomplishing it through a different means. The thought amused the General to no end, here was a direct role switch to the normal Asgard-Human engineering concepts. He wonder if Thor or little Hermy over there felt the same way, or did they see it something differently using those big old grey heads of theirs.

Hermiod however scoffed at the very sight of the human's entrancement, no doubt their primitive minds perceiving only a pretty light then the technological achievement that they were part of. True, he had to give some credit, they were innovative, with the limited technology his race had generously provided them, and no small amount of creativity, they had managed to bring about a design that he, in his near two thousand years of life, most likely never would have brought to creation. While it was primitive in the sense that it lacked the usually necessary advanced control systems that made up particle weapons, it was extremely efficient, all things taken into consideration, a marvel of this young race's ingenuity.

Gliding a control node across the azure computers surface, an array of holograms jumped out into his view, in it he could gaze at the beams path without going to the effort of joining the humans as they gaped like fish. His view of the terran homeworld and the thin blue line that represented the beams path, was dotted with half a dozen green blips of light at various orbital altitude, slowly moving in a lazy circle around the sphere, even without the small and detailed description beneath each dot, it was easy to tell that they were the human's handful of ships patrolling around their homeworld. Curiously a small purple flash blinked in empty space near the particle beam, followed by a flash of words underneath, an IFF code as the humans called it. It was one of their newer vessels, the Icarus, a heavier variant of their Daedalus class, specifically equipped with more superior Asgard technology instead of their own. No doubt it had arrived eagerly to see the demonstration, though wisely they had exited to the edges of the test area.. Still, Hermiod thought it necessary to warm them of the dangers, if the situation became dire, he would not find himself blamed for human stupidity.

Sliding one of the half dozen orb like devices down the marked path, he announced to the invisible, but now active communication system built into his asgardian console. "Human Starship Icarus, this is Hermiod of the Asgard. Be advised, you are near a temporarily restricted area of space, you are not to enter under any circumstances."

------

Earth High Orbit.

"Acknowledged Hermiod, we have been informed of the test firing and are holding position here, Icarus out."

The Icarus had plunged into orbit, leaving the purple blossom of hyperspace to float above the world of its creation. The starship barely twitched forward from the jump as it hovered silently above earth, its crew mostly ignorant on what was about to happen in the coming seconds, despite the senior staff's giddy anticipation. The test firing of the supposedly working planetary defence weapon was taking place, and they were not greeted with disappointment.

Staring out from the open window at the right of the bridge, a sword of cobalt energy stood out in contrast to the darkness of space. Given this blindly obvious example, it was pretty much assured the test was a success, though that didn't stop the confused and sceptical from repeatedly scanning the gigantic energy surge.

Newkirk merely smiled, he just sat back and enjoyed the view, it was a nice change from hyperspace at least.

-----

Area 51, Reactor Room

Deep within the inconspicuous 'secondary' reactor room underneath the main facility, away from the aging fission reactors powering the day to day operations and research facilities above, was a small, seemingly isolated wall decorated with a collection of strange devices that couldn't possibly be part of a power system. That is of course that you had no idea how far humanity had advanced over the decade. They were Naquadah reactors, devices that gave out a power output that put even the most advanced fission reactors to shame. Each one had a specific purpose, specifically a fair few of them for separate tasks of the weapon firing into orbit. Several were used to power the device itself, another two were pushing their limit to support the massive cloaking field, and a final device to power the magnetic field of the beam for redundancy. Suffice to say it well monitored set up considering its purpose, any faults in any power system would automatically shut down the entire grid, at least that was the theory. A theory that went right down the toilet when reactor 12 incorrectly detected an overload and initiated a shutdown procedure.

-----

Weapons Control

So engaged were the observers, they took little to no notice of the myriad of warning sounds emitting from Hermiods console, nor did they catch the glimpsing change of tone from the beam itself. When the reactor powering the secondary magnetic field emitters halted its flow of power, no one took into account that the primaries could hold out alone, nor did they expect the weapon to still be firing in the odd chance it did. One by one, systems shut down erratically , targeting was the first to go, then interstellar sensors, the observers took serious notice once the distorting glow around the sky faltered and then collapsed, the result of the cloak failing.

-----

Area 51, Border.

"Holy crap"

The only words that escaped Wright's mouth as he witnessed where the amazing blue light was coming from. Like the ships beforehand, the device miles away was hidden by some sort of stealth technology beyond what he ever thought was possible. He was mesmerized, completely ignorant of his partners continuous barking to move on.

Gardner, tired of waiting decided to be a bit more forceful, he walked up to Wright grabbing his shoulder he persisted, "kid what are you doing, we've still got the southern bord…..oh." Finally taking notice of the scene and joined in gaping at something other then a new ship "Well that's a new one." He muttered quietly, not moving his hardened eyes from the spectacular light show.

-----

Weapons Control

For the first time in a while, Hermiod was concerned, this should not had happened. Warning symbols phased over his original holographic scans though he paid them no heed, he knew full well the dangers of what was happening, even the humans were responding with caution the sudden shift of the beam. He did everything in his power to prevent disaster.

His fragile hands danced across the console, the crystal orbs shifting places in a hopeless attempt to rectify the rapidly weakening containment fields. In the case of power failure, all systems should shut down simultaneously not one by one, and even if it did safety systems built into the design prevented something like this from happening. Vital seconds ticked by, as the magnetic fields faded slowly as their source of power dwindled away, Thor turned to him questioningly, about to ask what was wrong, but Hermiod did not listen, instead focused on attempting a manual shut down, no such luck, the automatic shut down sequence was in place, and as the program was designed to be instantaneous, and therefore would not acknowledge a second attempt. By now it would be too late, all Hermiod and anyone else could do was stare out in horror as the field dropped in orbit.

-----

Earth Orbit

The blade of light shattered across its length, the weakened magnetic field could only travel so far, while the ion beam continued to lance out because of its continued supply of power. However since the magnetic tube no longer contained the near light speed moving particles, the stream burst out like a fountain, spraying out through space, ionized atoms flying randomly like a hose, including its into its lone observer.

The crew of the Icarus had no time to react, no time to even flinch let alone power shields, or better yet manoeuvre away. Yet the engineering crew would hold to the end, that seconds before the event the abdominally quiet Asgard technician uttered two words that was practically as shocking then the accident itself. Vindar had, in that split second or two before the strike, noticed the abnormal readings moments before it had occurred, with no means to defend against what was happening, and nothing else to lose if it was truly the end, he sighed one last time as under his brief, he muttered the only thing that was really appropriate for something like this.

"Oh….shit."

-----

Sirius Sector, 238 light years from Sol System.

The world was cold and windy, the frosty air hitting the group a chill to the bone, people were freezing their collective arses off as they huddled together in their thankfully insulated jackets, at least the MALP had detected the ongoing blizzard on its early patrol of the gate area and they wisely prepared, to bad of course they couldn't just scrub the mission for that, no that would have actually made sense. Despite the numerous complaints from his three team member, Colonel Tobias would hear none of it, he actually liked this kind of weather, well at least tolerated better then most. He a Royal Air Force Wing Commander, designated by the numerous American members of the SGC as Colonel for sheer convenience sake, lead SG-36, better known as the 'British Team.' As part of the new regulations that came with the recent influx of funding via the International Committee, each member-nation was provided with at least one active gate team, in the United Kingdoms case, it was the bare minimum. Their government's economic assets were shifted in a different area, the build up of their currently small navy of space vessels. Through recent independent negotiations with the United States, the Royal Space Navy, as it was officially, yet none the less secretly designated, had managed to acquire the designs to the newer, more powerful Daedalus Class Heavy Missile Cruisers, the result being the construction of the Hood to reinforce the small armada of 303's under British control. In conjunction with the negotiations, the plans for the prototype Victory Destroyers were put forward and rapid production was underway by both nations, not to mention massive amounts of funds going to dozens of separate R&D projects separate from IOA sponsored programs, the most noticeable of which being an orbital space station when the time was convenient.

Shivering slightly in her thick jacket, Doctor Katherine Gerald still eyed greedily at the small geological instrument, its reader flying off the charts, indicating the huge veins of Naquadah deep below her. The young Scottish woman was fresh out from university with a doctorate in Geochemistry, her relatively young career as a willing scientist out to make her name ultimately lead her on a wild goose chase for the highly speculated 126th element, the holy grail of modern science leading the scientific community to largely dismiss it despite the media hype. She was not among them

The 'discovery' was made public by the, then economic super-corporation Farrow-Marshall, notable in the media lately for the recent disappearance of its former CEO and owner Cliff Simons after mere weeks of taking the position as head of the group. The reaction was, unsurprisingly, enormous, particularly politically, as it soon lead to the company's demise. Mere hours later from the press announcement the extensive contacts between the aero-dynamics divisions United States Air Force were suddenly cut, leaving to wild rumours in the sceptical world that ranged from being plausible to borderline insanity. Mostly they were about illuminati type collection of businessmen trying to control the government through technological development, which lead to paranoid thoughts of alien interaction, hell even interstellar travel managed to get mixed into it all.

'Amazing how close they were to the truth.' She thought wirily, thinking about the early attempts at finding the supposedly quartz like material after the instant denial from the quickly bankrupting Farrow-Marshall. Despite the urging of her colleagues and mentors to stop what was widely through as a fools errand, she extensively searched for any possible leads ranging from private talks to a former executive of Colson Industries, ancient archaeological findings dating back to the Early Dynastic period of Egypt, to vague references from Inside Access's dropped story of something called 'Prometheus'. Years of research, thousands of pounds down the drain, evidence piling but nothing truly concrete, it was all looking to be hopeless, given that Farrow-Marshall's small supply mysteriously 'disappeared' before any third party study could take place to confirm the reports, and she couldn't do that without physical evidence of the material. Luckily, she found her goldmine in late 2006.

In a cold miserable place, just like the world she was on now, laid the shattered remains from a small meteor shower that slammed into the freezing tundras of upper Canada in 3 years previous, fragments from a large asteroid that apparently was unknown until several weeks after the impact, despite its relative proximity to Earth, this lead young doctor to think of one thing. Cover up.

Taking a healthy sample from the numerous collection of craters, Katherine began studying the element back at her make-shift laboratory, even with only limited equipment she was easily able to confirm the original speculation, and then some. Not only was it the only known super-conductor to operate at room temperature, it was an extremely effective one, capable of absorbing far more then mere electricity, but it was also able to absorb neutrinos, energizing it beyond anything conceived. The potential applications practically limitless just from these factors alone and she hadn't even begun to study its capabilities. It was too bad she never really got the chance.

Within four days of her initial 'discovery', she was greeted at the door by two members of M-I6, offering her an opportunity of a lifetime, and a revelation that ruined her plans to fame. Suffice to say, one thing lead to another, her now government sponsored study of Naquadah, as she came to learn its actual name, brought her here, joining SG-36 in the hopes of finding an undiscovered source of Naquadah from the eight United States mining colonies had assumed direct control over.

Pacing away from the huddle, the scanners counter was rising ever so slowly, her smug grin matching as it grew as well " I tell you we hit jackpot on this freezing little piece of hell, we can set up an independent resource base and send runs through hyperspace" she announced to her other team mates, the two younger officers listening with interest . "Hell, because of this, we won't have to rely on the yanks for scraps." Lieutenant Ferguson grinned at the prospect, yet the middle aged Colonel merely snorted.

"Bah, people today, all materialists, all you think about is profits, expansion, money!" he cried out boastfully, "No I only want one thing from this fair world." Tobias declared as he moved his hand proudly across the distance horizon, as if he was impressed by this ice-ball.

None the less, Katherine decided to humour him "Oh? And what's that Colonel?" she asked somewhat sarcastically.

His usually grinning face turned to an uncharacteristic look of thought, though it was probably just for show. "Oh not much, a nice little home to retire to, secluded from it all," he mused the idea over while stroking at the short stubble on his chin "If your theory is correct doctor, who knows? I may even get myself my own planet to call home."

'Now who's materialistic' Doctor Gerald thought to herself. Not getting the chance to respond when Captain Winters beat her to the punch "What would you do with your own world Sir?"

"Maybe a small repair shop, in a few decades if we build ourselves a little empire in the stars, I may very well get the occasional visitor, young Eddie probably wouldn't enjoy the peace and quite as much as I do, but this is all into the future my friends." Smirking as a thought came to mind "I'll probably name it Leeds."

If it was anyone else, Katherine would have immediately rolled her eyes at such comments, yet after the months of dealing with his somewhat childish comments, she had come to tolerate his antics.

Just then, Tobias's radio crackled to life, startling the crew slightly, support from the gate was still not due for an hour, meaning there was a ship nearby. While still in the original chassis of a standard walkie-talkie used by the SGC since it's founding, this was a device that fit the good old saying, judge a book by its cover. Underneath the plastic covering, the design was totally different from the base product, instead of a generic radio transceiver, a small scale sub-space transceiver took its place, allowing communication not only into high orbit, but deep into a star system, having a range that stretched into the light-hour distance. Obviously, they were expensive as hell, the advanced crystal technology that was the basis of all reversed-engineered systems used by earth were only recently becoming producible in any decent quantity, so only team commanders were issued, and even then only when the situation demanded it.

The British colonel fumbled for the small device, unclasping it from his belt and switching the transmitter on with a flick of the thumb "Tobias."

Deep within opaque shadows of stellar space, the brick-like form of a Daedalus surged with a speed that its shape betrayed. While entering this area of space, immediate problems with the Hyperdrive occurred, to keep a stabile pathway through hyperspace the ships speed was reduced massively, 1400 times light speed, barely a crawl with the Asgard designed drives, a less powerful drive would have been forced into sub-light. At least it was only a small concentrated area on the outskirts of the sector, scans picked up a network of massive nebula clouds ringing around the local stellar group one of which they were passing through when the speed drop occurred , something that wasn't exactly unique as the crew of the Prometheus found out on her trip home from Tegrea years ago.

On the ships bridge, an aging portly man sat comfortably in the command chair, using his small preconised microphones to communicate several dozen light minutes away in real-time. "Colonel, this is Commandore Langley, the Hood is arrived in system and is approaching the world you and your team are on. Orders are from the top levels of government to lay claim to the planet and surrounding space, we'll be beaming down a small garrison and establishing a defensive position in orbit." He announced in a professional demeanour, yet couldn't help but continue . "Congratulations, you've just founded the United Kingdoms newest colony."

Back on the planet, SG-36 heard every word of the navy officer's announcement, and responded with more then a few incredulous looks. Tobias himself quickly acknowledged and turned off the radio while sighing deeply.

"Well, I didn't exactly expect it to happen that fast…" was all that he said.

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Ieran'vec Star System

The diminutive privateer covette exited hyperspace, breeching the blossom of purple light into high planetary orbit of the small brown and blue orb thousands of kilometres below. The planet itself, Ieran'vec, was a random place to say the least, constantly shifting hands between system lords over the past millennia, its usefulness depending solely on who owned it. Under Ra it was a forgotten world, only visited once every ten years by a self-important, but likewise insignificant lieutenant Goa'uld under the former supreme system lords domain. In time it turned into to a thriving military garrison and supply station under Sokar's, then Apophis's rule in his cold war against the combined System Lords due to its proximity to Tuat, Baal's throne world, and one of the few pathways to it from Delmak due to the constant blockades on the world at the time.

Now, it was somewhat different, abandoned by all sides in the new and drastically changed galaxy, the Human and Jaffa inhabitants of the world below managed to salvage something out of their life. The few ships left on the planetary surface were used to reach high orbit, where the near derelict space station, a former command and control centre for Apophis's fleets in his war against Baal 8 years ago. It was rebuilt bit by bit over the years, no longer as a battle fortress, but as a growing trading hub in the unaffiliated regions of space. Traders, pirates, even major fleets from the main powers in the galaxy came through this region of space, Lucien Alliance ships in particular had business at the station, given that the management originally had a policy of not looking into its customers business, as long as they followed the rules, and paid their fees. That of course quickly changed when the Alliance took more and more of a controlling influence of the non-aligned worlds throughout the galaxy, soon Ieran'vec became an Alliance operated station in all but name.

The Divinity cruised swiftly in the stations direction, her sensors dotting numerous classes of ships, be it simple transports running from the station to the planet below, sturdy looking cargo ships controlled by both the planets populous and random traders, to the workhorse motherships of the Ha'taks class, under the command of the Lucian Alliance. While originally hired to act as a military force for the entire star system, their ruthless control of basic control of the 'savage regions' of space was uncontested to their sheer numbers of ships, this world was no exception.

Speaking of which, the mix-matched comm. system that the crew managed to salvage screeched to life, the message coming from one of the three motherships guarding over the station. On Dre'vacs nod, Tr'ay accepted the signal, as the primary holographic readout flashed and crackled to a smug looking human drabbed in sophisticated business attire, a strange uniform for anyone but a Lucien Alliance ship captain.

The image warped slightly yet the only thing that changed on the man himself was to look even more arrogant then before, sitting high and mighty in the commonly placed throne chair still put on the majority of Ha'taks, probably seeing an easy target in the patch work brick that they've come to call a ship. "Unidentified Al'kesh this is the Lucian Alliance Starship Taralga, under contract of the Ieran'vec Merchants Council."

'Contracted my mikta.' Tr'ay snarled at the thought, ',you and your fellow human scum, most likely saw an opportunity and then forced them to pay you for so called protection,' she summed up given her admittedly limited, but noticeable experience she shared with the human syndicate. He continued in a bored, almost automatic tone, not even focusing at the two Jaffa as he droned on, "you are entering Ieran'vec Space, you are ordered to stand down all weapon systems and identify yourselves, failure to comply will result in disabling and seizure of your vessel." Despite his seemingly distracted tone, it wasn't hard to notice the small amount of glee at those last words. Typical humans, always thinking about profit.

Before Tr'ay could tell the insignificant worm off, Dre'vac acknowledged the ship captain calmly as one could expect of a Jaffa Master. "Understood Taralga, this is the private vessel Conveyer of Divinity, under the command of former Ship Master Dre'vac, we are hear to refuel and barter, then we will be on our way." He informed the human while sending a single file through the sub-space data-link established between the two ships.

The human just gazed at them curiously, probably part of his job as an inspector to all ships moving any where near the space station, but despite it all it still was extremely irritating to Tr'ay, all she wanted to do was get off this rust-bucket and move to that much bigger rust-bucket floating lazily in orbit, it at least was somewhat liveable. To her surprise his expression broke, after a quick but lazy gaze at his own readouts, his face shattered into the first serious look he had taken in their brief meeting. "Stand by." He ordered briefly before shutting down the hologram.

Tr'ay looked curiously up at Dre'vac, the former Ship Master just smiling broadly "I expected something like this to occur, so I just took the liberty of sending our good friend over there the exact details of our cargo mission."

At that Tr'ay smirked "Didn't realise we're under their employment?"

"Precisely, though admittedly its not often you get Lucien Alliance craft this close to the Empire, that's why they work through us." The female Jaffa nodded in acknowledgement, yes she couldn't exactly see a fleet of Lucien Alliance Ha'taks dropping into orbit of Delmak only to deliver grain of all things. Suddenly the view of space outside the bridge windows warped once more, the ghostly hologram of the Taralga's captain appearing in its stead. His now professional persona a direct contrast to his earlier appearance.

"You've been authorized to dock with the station, all transactions will involve a 10 percent trading tax to the station administrators, as well as an additional 5 percent to the Lucien Alliance Paramilitary Forces, any smuggling of Kassa crop shall be punished severely by station security." He announced formally.

Dre'vac nodded curtly , hiding his amusement "Understood Taralga, we're moving to the Hub," using the informal name of the widely known space station as both the hologram and connection disengaged, leaving nothing but the cloud covered orb and its guardians in space as the Divinity pushed closer and closer to the orbiting goliath that many traders had come to known as a home away from home.

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Additional Note-For those with any knowledge of physics, yes I realise that how the ion cannon buggered up would not actually happen that way, suffice to say it was either that or go ahead with my original idea of having the Icarus exiting hyperspace right into the path of the beam, which in my opinion is even far less plausible, none the less, it's a plot device, personally, I don't really care, no one said sci-fi was scientifically spot on.


End file.
